


Magnets

by aphreal



Category: Dragon Age, Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-30
Updated: 2014-05-30
Packaged: 2018-01-27 14:04:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1713269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aphreal/pseuds/aphreal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She’s drawn to him, even though she knows she shouldn’t be. So she holds him at a distance, denying the attraction that she’ll never be able to act on. </p><p>It’s like magnets. You can hold them apart, but it takes effort. And sooner or later, your arms are going to get tired.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Magnets

When the Warden Commander first told them, standing at Ostagar as two among many, that a Grey Warden must be sacrificed to end a Blight, it seemed remote, almost irrelevant. What did the duty of senior Wardens matter to Ferelden’s two newest recruits? It was a tragedy, but not a personal one. 

Later, with all of their fellow Wardens laying dead on the battlefield, the reality of the situation set in: one of them was going to die. 

So she kept him at a careful distance. They were comrades, bound together by commitment to a shared goal, but it was a goal that only one of them could survive. There was no point in trying to become friends. And anything more than that was completely unthinkable. 

A fact which she had to remind herself of far too often over the following months. After every half-smile and self-deprecating joke, every look of bashful admiration, every time he threw himself into their cause with unswerving passion, she forced herself to remember the Warden Commander’s words, to accept the inevitable and the impossible. She remained resolute, treated him with respect but no warmth, and sternly ignored any thoughts of things that couldn’t be. 

When he began slipping away for private conversations with the pretty, sweet redhead, it hurt, but at the same time it was almost a relief. He had moved on. He would stop looking at her that way, stop testing her resolve. He might even have a chance at a future, at happiness. 

Late at night, lying awake in her tent with only her faithful mabari to see her weakness, she wondered if maybe it would be better to make sure she gave him that future, in lieu of everything else she could never offer him. It wasn’t as if she would be giving anything up, not really. Nothing that mattered. 

The decision gradually took form in her mind, slowly building from an idle fancy into a solid reality, a plan to anchor what little future she had. He shattered it without even a word. 

She watched them, him and the bard, whenever they were together in camp. It was a satisfying sort of torture, their gentle touches and soft laughter reinforcing both what she was denied and why she should be the one to fall. Wouldn’t it be worth it to preserve that sort of happiness, even if it wasn’t her own? 

One night, while she stared after them with hungry regret, he looked back at her. Their eyes met, and for an instant, the pain and longing on his face mirrored her own. She bowed her head, shying away from that uncomfortable revelation. What good would it do to die for the sake of happiness that was a lie? When she looked back up, they were gone, slipped away from the camp into the darkness, and she was plunged back into a confusing morass of needs and impossibilities, without even the clean certainty of death ahead of her. 

 

She never expected to find hope in a dungeon. She certainly never expected that the man who’d taken everything else from her would give her this one precious thing back, even if he did it without meaning to or knowing. Of course, that inadvertent generosity didn’t stop her from killing him. 

But the Orlesian Warden they found imprisoned in a cell in his dungeons changed everything. 

She felt something inside her shift at the sight of him, at the potential he represented, but there was no time for teasing out the implications and ramifications. It would have to wait until later. 

Events came rapidly after that, leaving no room to consider trivial matters of personal wants or hopes. The first chance she had to think was in a cell of her own. 

Her eyelids fluttered and she groaned, raising a hand to the lump on her head. 

“Oh, good, you’re awake. I was getting worried.” His voice echoed strangely in her ears, and she couldn’t tell if it was a product of the surroundings, her concussion, or the recent shift in her awareness of him. 

She felt the scratch of rough stone against bare skin as she moved, trying to assess the extent of her aches. “What happened to my armor?” 

“The guards took it. I imagine they’re trying to keep us vulnerable. I tried to get clothing in exchange, but apparently prisoners don’t get to make requests.” The wry edge to his voice was strangely comforting, despite the circumstances. 

She sat up, feeling exposed, the air cold against her uncovered flesh. “I suppose prisoners also don’t get modesty.” 

“I haven’t been looking.” There was a pink tinge to the skin of his face and chest, and she suspected – hoped? – he was lying. 

Needing to get a sense of their environment, she stood up, staggering as everything spun around her, pulsing in time with the throb in her temple. Her legs gave out, and she collapsed gracelessly. 

Before she could hit the floor, he was there, holding her up, and she fell against warm muscle rather than cold stone. With her skin pressed against his, his arms around her, her hands settling naturally at his hips, she regained her balance but felt dizzy for an entirely new reason. 

When he suggested she might not be ready to stand up on her own yet, she readily accepted his assistance in lowering herself back to the ground, ending up sitting beside him, closer than she should, touching at the shoulders and along the length of their legs. But now that she had no reason to keep her distance, she couldn’t maintain the effort to resist being near him. 

No. They might have found a reprieve from guaranteed death, but there were still reasons that what she wanted wasn’t right. She shouldn’t let herself forget that. “Don’t worry. I’m sure your girlfriend won’t let them keep you here long.” 

He laughed, a harsh and bitter bark. “If she comes to our rescue, it won’t be for me.” She felt him shift as he shrugged, hyperaware of his arm brushing against hers. “It’s no secret that we’ve both been settling.” 

Her head spun as the world changed yet again, the day’s revelations outpacing her ability to keep up. She turned to look at him, studying his face unguarded and totally open for once. Almost unbidden, her hand raised to brush against his cheek, feeling the slight rasp of stubble under her calloused fingers. His lips parted in a tiny gasp at the contact, and she couldn’t stop staring at them, wanting to feel and taste. 

“Would you let me…” She stopped, unable to say the words, to finally bridge the chasm she’d kept between them for so long. 

His eyes were dark and fixed on her intently, his voice husky and soft. “Whatever the rest of that question is… yes.” 

She wasn’t sure whether she was entranced more by his desire or his trust. What had she ever done to earn either?

How could she do anything other than accept both? 

The space between them that had always felt insurmountable disappeared surprisingly easily as she leaned in to bring her lips to meet his. The initial contact was tentative, but then all hesitation vanished as they crashed together, giving in to a need that, in hindsight, had always been inevitable.


End file.
